Saturday, April 28, 2012

The South Asian Women’s Creative
Collective (SAWCC) is a nonprofit arts organization dedicated to the
advancement, visibility, and development of emerging and established South
Asian women artists and creative professionals by providing a physical and
virtual space to profile their creative and intellectual work across
disciplines.

Literature:
We are interested in ‘zines, chapbooks, monographs, fiction, nonfiction,
poetry, anthologies, etc. authored or edited by South Asian women. After the
Queens Museum exhibition, these items will go into our archive.

Submissions - post:
- One physical copy of each title, must be submitted by author/editor of the
work

We also invite original
haiku, which may be inspired by SAWCC artists or may (loosely) fit the mission
and work of SAWCC. Selected pieces will be printed on vinyl and presented on
the walls of the exhibition.

Submissions - emailed as
attachments:
- No more than 3 haiku pieces per person, submitted in a Word document

Wednesday, April 25, 2012

Out of Printauthor and friend, Chandrahas
Choudhury’s Arzee the Dwarf is translated into German as Der Kleine Koenig von Bombay. Editor Samhita Arni’s
reviewthat appeared in Caravan in October 2009 heralded Arzee as ‘a welcome
change in a literature that has, for the most part, been susceptible to
reflecting the narrow, English-speaking world of its writers and many of its
readers.’ Arzee’s adventures, real and imagined, dreamt and experienced resonate
to the ‘beating and pulsing’ as the blurb says, of Bombay. At the height of his
despair Arzee says, ‘I’ve lived so many lives already, I’ve seen incarnations!
Now I’ll live another: I’ll be a new man. I was so miserable, so desperate, so
abject! But now I am at peace, now I am strong, because I’ve left my
make-believe life behind.’ But if we are uncertain if his soul has been stifled
by his resolve, we know it is not so as, in front of Maratha Mandir cinema hall
where Dilwale Dulhaniya still plays at
the matinee, he reflects on ‘the miracle of art – it stayed evergreen, kept
speaking and speaking to people.’ Will this incarnation of Arzee, stay true to his essential faith in the magic of make-believe and convey the great pulsing soul of
his city to a German readership? We cannot wait to hear.

From the blurb:Ustad Ramzi was once the greatest wrestler in the land, famed for his enormous strength and unmatched technique. Young apprentices flocked to his akhara to learn his craft, fans adored him, and rival wrestling clans feared his resolve that would never admit defeat. The courtesan Gohar Jan was just as renowned. Celebrated throughout the country for her beauty and the power and melodiousness of her singing, her kotha was thronged by nobles, rich men, and infatuated admirers.

Musharraf Ali Farooqi’s new novel opens with a glimpse of these extraordinary characters in the twilight of their lives. Their skills are no longer what they once were, new challengers to their eminence have now arisen, their followers have melted away, and the adoring crowds are long gone. An immense catastrophe has laid waste to the country; its new inheritors and rulers have no time for the old ways and, stripped of their resources and their old powers, Ustad Ramzi and Gohar Jan must face their greatest challenge yet…

Powerful and haunting, Between Clay and Dust is a triumph of storytelling and a poignant exploration of love, honour, redemption and the strength that great souls find to go on when everything is lost."

Naseeruddin Shah says of the novel: A privileged peek into the mind of the Pahalwan and Courtesan, the subcontinent's most intriguing symbols of romance. Storytelling at its best.

From the Blurb: Wry, tender, borderline surreal, Difficult Pleasures is a collection of stories about the need to escape and the longing to belong.

Anjum, commenting on reading and writing short stories says,A collection of stories is not a novel in disguise. And a short story is not an equation. There is always something left over at the end of a modern story—in the reader, the desire to know more, perhaps, or the feeling that something inexpressible has been communicated. I like that idea—that in writing a story one is writing nothing more, but also nothing less, than ‘just’ a story.

Waiting to figure out the exciting ways in which Out of Printwill be part of this cool new platform for the arts:Check outJUNOONan amazing new effort by Sanjana Kapoor and Sameera Iyengar to create multiple platforms to access, engage with and enjoy theatre and the related arts.Here is what Sanjana and Sameera say:

Greetings from Junoon!

We have an audacious idea. We believe that the arts need to be an integral part of our world. And we believe that together we can make this happen. And so we've created Junoon.

As Junoon, we will create multiple platforms where you can access, engage with, and enjoy theatre and the related arts. Over the year, we will unravel a calendar of interactions and engagements to delight us all. A lot of this will initially happen in Mumbai, but soon spread to different parts of the country. That's our dream. We invite you to join us -- to participate, to help us spread the word, to celebrate the joy of theatre.

Engaging children and youth is key to the world that Junoon wants to build. Our ARTS AT PLAY programme will offer youngsters a series of delicious engagements with the arts over the year.

We begin with our summer season of workshops and plays -- which some of you have previously known as Summertime with Prithvi Theatre. This programme was started by Sanjna 22 years ago to bring the strength of theatre to youngsters. This programme will now be run under the banner of Junoon's ARTS AT PLAY -- keeping the original vision, and building on our existing team of super conductors.

This year, we are delighted to offer 45 workshops across 5 venues in Mumbai and a season of plays -- 49 shows of 18 plays -- at Prithvi Theatre. This will run from mid-April to early June -- details are up on our site, and forms will be available, as usual from 1st April.

Do visit our website www.junoontheatre.org -- to know more about our dreams and plans, and to get details of ARTS AT PLAY. And if you share our dream, get involved, come for our programmes, spread the word -- and help us infuse the arts into our lives.

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Out of Print provides an online platform for writers of short fiction with a connection to the subcontinent. Traditions of story-telling layer our collective contemporary voice. Send us your stories and we’ll send them to the world.